Back To The Future: Double Visions

Review

Is Telltale's vision blurring slightly?

“Luckily I know something about my own mind!”

We now reach the penultimate episode of Telltale’s Back To The Future series, and things are really starting to get desperate. Marty and Doc’s meddling in 1931 has seen Hill Valley 1986 transformed into a dystopian police state, with Doc himself married to the insane Edna Strickland. At the end of the last episode Marty managed to persuade “First Citizen Brown” that his life was actually messed up, but Edna had them both carted off to be “reprogrammed” into model citizens.

The basic goal of Episode 4 is to help both Marty and Doc escape the Citizen Plus program, and then travel back in time to stop Young Emmett Brown and Ms Strickland from ever getting together. It is not spoiling anything to say that they succeed and travel back to 1931; but as to the how’s, the why’s and the oh-dears, I won’t spoil a thing.

The story is the main component that Back To The Future has going for it, and luckily things are still ticking over nicely. The finale is set up and the surprises keep coming. Actually, it is not just the story but also the characters that are keeping these episodes afloat. There are not any new faces in Double Visions, but most of the old ones get a chance to shine at some point in this episode. The Tannen family take a backseat for once, as Edna Strickland comes to prominence as both a detestable (1986) and sympathy-inducing (1931) villain.

“It might tarnish my image as a muse!”

After playing this latest episode, it has become necessary for me to say that I particularly like Trixie Trotter - one of the few entirely new characters to the series (most of the others are family members of the well-known film characters). While not particularly intelligent, she certainly is not a straight “dumb blonde” and has been key to the plot in this fourth episode as well as the second.

However, it is Emmett Brown who steals the show here in both his young and old incarnations – with neither of them being the lovable Doc from the movies. I am trying my best to not give any spoilers, but suffice to say it quickly becomes apparent that Christopher Lloyd’s First Citizen Brown certainly is not as wonderful as he appears. This interesting Doc-but-not-Doc keeps the plot interesting and will continue further into the final episode.

The writing in this episode is superb as always, and the voice acting does not disappoint either. The whole filmic angle of the games is portrayed very well and would work brilliantly as a Back To The Future Part Four or TV series. But how is it doing as a game?